Oppa Pyongyang Style

What does Bing Crosby’s brother have to do with North Korean propaganda videos? We’ll find out. But first, a Friday mystery, Match wits with Lance, Minneapolis’ snap-judgement detective!

Answer at the bottom.

CELEBS If you’re wondering why so many “stars” get arrested for pot possession in the same Texas town, EOnline can help. Turns out the town of Sierra Blanca is close to Mexico, which has lots of marijuana, and it’s on an interstate, which is used by musicians who bring along their pot.

“Little Miss Fiona, last night her bus rolls in here, and the [drug-sniffing] dog hits the smell of pot from outside of the bus," says Rusty Fleming, public information officer for the Hudspeth County Sheriff's Office. "We searched the bus and found it in a sealed glass container inside of a backpack way in the back of the bus. That's a pretty sensitive dog."

Savor, if you will, that “Little Miss Fiona,” with all its mock courtesy and amused contempt. Rusty goes on:

Ninety percent of the people out here will try to flash their medical marijuana cards," Fleming explains. "Snoop flashed his real quick. But those don't matter to us. We're Texans. This isn't California!"

You know, if Snoop Lion has a legitimate medical-marijuana card, it just might be their standards for handing them out are rather elastic.

HISTORY Yesterday we posted a picture of a disconsolate Uncle Sam, depressed because he hadn’t bought enough guns from Cubans. Well, the very next cartoon in the Minneapolis Tribune 1900 Collection:

They’ve come to their senses! Thank the tireless efforts of editorial cartoonists everywhere. This was the old style: they illustrated a point without managing to make one.

INTERNET The world is weirder than you can possibly imagine.

On 19th September, North Korea uploaded a video with the title "I'm Yushin style!" onto the government website Uriminzokkiri as a parody of South Korea's ruling conservative party presidential candidate Park Geun-hye. The video shows a photo-shopped image of her doing the horse-riding dance, and mocks her as a devoted admirer of the "Yushin" system of autocratic rule set up by her father, Park Chung-hee.

These guys have always been bad at propaganda. This is awful:

If you’re going to do some Gangnam-Style parody, use the song. That’s “Big Noise from Winnetka” - the Mancini version.

That leads us to these guys:

The Bobcats, the guys who invented the song in the first place. The Bobcats was a side project of some musicians from the Bob Crosby Orchestra. Bob Crosby was Bing’s brother. You have to feel a bit of sympathy for people who are good at what they do, but have a famous sibling who’s better. Or perceived as better, because they’re more popular. Has a brother ever come along and replaced the famous one in the public imagination? I don’t think so.

I’ve always felt bad for documentarian Ric Burns, for example. Ken’s brother. You wonder if there were bitter arguments over the dinner table growing up - dammit, Ric, there’s only room for one documentarian in this family - but they seem to get along. If you’ve never seen Ric Burn’s “New York.” it’s worth the 17 hours. It’s really good, and has a economical soundtrack, used and reused to great effect.

LANCE LAWSON SOLUTIONLance checked the light fixture. It didn't spark when turned on - so the man was telling the truth. If it had sparked before he opened the windows, there would have been an explosion.